Featured Report: Employers adjust to Obamacare? Employee health benefits rose 4.1 percent in 2012

Med City News
Nov,15,2012
by: Diane Stafford
The cost of employee health benefits in 2012 grew just 4.1 percent nationally, the smallest increase in 15 years. The National Survey of Employer-Sponsored Health Plans, conducted annually by Mercer, said Wednesday that cost growth slowed this year from 6.1 percent in 2011. A subset survey of 50 Kansas City area employers found a 4.3 percent increase this year, but the average per-employee cost of health benefits locally was $10,180, or 3.6 percent below the national average cost of $10,558.

Employers have "taken bold steps to soften the impact" of the Affordable Care Act in 2014, said Julio Portalatin, Mercer chief executive. "Employers are very aware that in 2014, when the health reform law's provisions kick in, they will be asked to cover more employees and face added cost pressure," Portalatin said.
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This Week's Healthcare News
Modern Healthcare.com
U.S. docs gain ground on health IT, but other countries lead
Nov,15,2012
by: Joseph Conn
The U.S. is not alone among high-income nations in its efforts to push health information technology use to primary-care providers, according to results of a recent survey by the Commonwealth Fund. Nor is the U.S. alone in its struggle to achieve interoperability of systems and the free exchange of healthcare information, the surveyors found. A "high percentage" of the nearly 8,500 physicians surveyed across the 10 nations covered by the survey "reported that they did not routinely receive timely information from specialists or hospitals," while feedback loops providing physicians with data about their own performance "varied notably" between countries, according to a report, "A Survey of Primary Care Doctors in Ten Countries Shows Progress in Use of Health Information Technology, Less in Other Areas," appearing online in the policy journal Health Affairs.
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iHealthBeat
Experts Tout Health IT Progress During Congressional Hearing
Nov,15,2012
by: Staff
On Wednesday, National Coordinator for Health IT Farzad Mostashari and other health IT experts touted the benefits of the meaningful use program in testimony before a subcommittee of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, Government Health IT reports (Brino, Government Health IT, 11/14). Under the 2009 federal economic stimulus package, health care providers who demonstrate meaningful use of certified electronic health record systems can qualify for Medicaid and Medicare incentive payments.
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MobiHealthNews
Digital health innovation was never in question
Nov,15, 2012
by: Neil Versel
We’ve all heard the election post-mortem by now. President Obama’s surprisingly comfortable re-election — along with the continued split control of Congress — means that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, a.k.a., Obamacare, is here to stay, although some Republican governors are deciding to let the federal government run their states’ health insurance exchanges and are opting out of the law’s Medicaid expansion. The “meaningful use” EHR incentive program isn’t going anywhere either. Just before the election, several GOP members of the House and Senate had questioned the appropriateness of the net $27 billion effort.
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Health and Wellness Seminars Coming January 2013
Chicagoland Healthcare Professionals:
Are you concerned about your practice can meet the Meaningful Use 1 and 2 regulations? Are your still struggling to understand and complete your EHR network? Do you know if you even qualify for the over $20 billion dollar EHR Incentive program funds? If answered YES to any of these questions.
Then make plans this January, 9, 2013 to attend the Health and Wellness Seminar hosted by Chicago's Uptown Business Partners. These seminars will explain in clear English not tech speak how to understand and complete an EHR for your practice how fund it and real solutions on how to find and IT partner help you complete your EHR and qualify for the EHR Incentive program. The first seminar Understanding EHR will take you step by step on how EHR works and how to create an EHR network. We will be teaching this totally interactive seminar and giving you real solutions to your EHR problem.
So make plans to attend this seminar and get the answers you need to help your practice meet all of the Meaningful Use Rules.

If you need answers to your Healthcare IT needs now visit our Healthcare Managed Services page at Wirehead Technology